Two and a half-year-old Kingfisher Airlines is looking for opportunities to deploy dedicated freighters but for the moment is content with the belly hold capacity from its combined fleet of 79 Airbus and ATR aircraft, according to Kingfisher’s general manager for cargo, Vijay Nair.
"We do have plans to look into dedicated freighters, whenever it looks viable and profitable,"he said. "With nearly 550 aircraft flying across India each day there is more than enough belly capacity to cater for the domestic needs.
"But, all said and done we are definitely looking for potential opportunities where we can deploy freighters but no concrete decision has been made on aircraft or routes,"he said. Potential routes would be either domestic or international as the carrier is going international with its first passenger flight by end of the year.
"If there is a good business case, if there is a potential on certain trade lanes, if there is a certain product that can be developed for which freighter capacity is required, we’re open to it,"Nair said. Most likely a dedicated freighter service outside the domestic market would follow its passenger routes for logistical reasons,he added.
Spreading its wings
Kingfisher recently purchased Air Deccan which roughly doubled its size and perhaps more importantly came with the five years of age minimum established by the Indian government before carriers can go international. The first international route will be Bangalore to San Francisco with Delhi to New York to follow, both using an A340.
An A330 will then be deployed at a later date for a Delhi and Mumbai to London service. The aircraft for these flights are expected to be delivered from April and would go to Air India in a wet lease deal until Kingfisher is ready touse them.
Nair added that there are "a lot of other airports we are aiming at, but these will be added as and when we are ready."
"We are scheduled for tremendous growth over the next 8 to 10 years,"he said with the group eying a fleet of close to 110 aircraft by 2010/11 and some 150 aircraft by 2015/16.
By 2010 or 2011, Kingfisher will have close to 110 aircraft and by 2015 this number will grow to close to 150 aircraft. Currently the carrier has 106 Airbus aircraft on order, including five A380s, the only Indian carrier to order the superjumbo.
"Our growth will be both domestic and international, but first we want to have India completely covered, within the next three years. On one hand our core strength is definitely going to be domestic, but international will also bevery important to us,"he said.
Eye on strategic partnership
Nair also indicated the carrier would be keen on some form of strategic tie-up with an international carrier, but said there was currently nothing in the works.
"For an international carrier it would only be appropriate to look at utilising our network, our strength in the domestic market through a partnership that would also be beneficial for us,"Nair said.
Nair acknowledged that infrastructure in India is a "big problem,"but added that the small amounts of privatisation that’s come into the airports is showing some light at the end of the tunnel.
"But the way things are growing today I hope that whatever expansion we are doing actually takes care of the growth that India has predicted for the next five years and not just some stop gap arrangement to ease the congestion now and two years down the line we again face another problem. That would be heading for disaster,"he cautions.